Concerned St. John the Baptist Parish residents will gather tonight at 7 p.m. at the West Side Volunteer Fire Department at 173 E. Third St. to discuss the fate of Edgard's only post office, which was slated for permanent service suspension in January but will now remain open until at least March of next year. After that date, however, St. John the Baptist Parish has pledged to take over lease negotiations with Capital Bank, the building's landlord, in order to try and keep the campus open, according to St. John the Baptist Parish Councilman Art Smith.

St. John the Baptist Parish Councilman Art Smith

"The lease is up, but we're taking over negotiations," Smith said.

Roughly 45 days ago, the U.S. Postal Service sent out a letter informing all Edgard residents that come 2013, their post office will cease all operations due to budgetary constraints. All local operations, the letter said, would be consolidated to the post office in Vacherie, which is a little more than 12 miles away from Edgard.

According to Postal Service spokesman McKinney Boyd, the Edgard post office is just one of many casualties of the economic forces bedeviling the Postal Service, among them the growth in online billing and digital correspondence. The Postal Service, Boyd said, loses $57 million each day; this past fiscal year, it suffered a $15 billion loss. Nationwide, 237 post offices have closed this year.

In the 2012 fiscal year, the Edgard post office grossed approximately $97,462 in revenue; its total expenditures, including $80,000 in rent and three employees' salaries, exceeded $260,000.

"This post office didn't pay for itself, not this year or last year, and this organization is experiencing financial challenge because of the decline in mail volume," Boyd said. "More and more of our measured mailers are using online services to mail their statements. So, without that kind of revenue, we're losing money. When organizations begin to lose money, they begin to look at ways to offset those expenses, by consolidating facilities."

Postal Service senior management is in talks with St. John Parish Councilman Art Smith to determine the terms of an agreement that, if approved, could keep the post office open permanently, once the U.S.P.S.'s 90-day extension expires.